Maybe on another day, in another post, I will attempt to describe what has been my new normal for the last year and a half. But I won't today. Today I just need to talk about something that has been weighing on my heart heavily for years and something that I have been deeply mourning the past two weeks.
If you've known me for any length of time, you know that I love being a Mama. Yes, there are hours and days and seasons that are insanely difficult and I tell Andrew that I don't know if I can do it again the next day, but at my core, I absolutely love it. I love my two boys, I love being a stay-at-home Mama, I love homeschooling, I love sweet cuddles and I love the sound of their voices when they say "I love you Mama" along with bedtime hugs.
If you've been around me a bit longer, and have sat and heard me pour out my heart, you know that I have always dreamed of a big family. Not massive, but 3-5 kids and a minivan. Full dinner tables, and a cacophony of noise throughout a small house that's bursting with love and chaos and Jesus Loves Me.
Only a small handful of you know this next part though. You've seen the mourning and you've heard the quiver in my voice and you've seen mascara running down my cheeks. There is a part of me, a big part if I'm honest, that doesn't want to write this and share this. But despite wanting to pretend that I am fine, that I am content, and that I completely trust the Lord has what is best for me in mind, I know that I have to share. I don't know who, but for some reason I know that I am supposed to write this and share this for someone. (If that someone is you, oh please know that my heart breaks for you and that I am praying for you even as I type this out).
Receiving the Rheumatoid Arthritis diagnosis closed the door on one of the biggest hopes and dreams of my life - having another baby.
No, this diagnosis in and of itself doesn't mean that. There are some medications that you can go on that have less risk for the baby, and a small percentage of women actually have a reduction in their RA symptoms during pregnancy. But that will not be me.
I've known it for awhile. Honestly, I've known it since I transitioned from a walker to a wheelchair during my pregnancy with Jamesy (if you don't know that story yet, you can read about it here). I just haven't wanted to actually say it aloud. When my midwives told me that I would be crazy to want another child because my PGP was so severe that there was a near guarantee of my next pregnancy being even worse than the one with Jamesy... I knew it. When Andrew looked at me time and time again with sadness in his eyes and told me he didn't think we should have another baby even though I begged him to pray about it and tried to convince him that it would be worth the excruciating pain I would more than likely go through... I knew it. When I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia... I knew it.
But when I was hit with this diagnosis? I had to finally admit it.
I had to admit that one of the things I want more than nearly anything else in the world will not be what I will be blessed with. Seeing that on the screen makes me want to throw up if I am honest. I don't want to look at it, because I don't want to acknowledge it. I want to continue to live in my little world where I am better and able to handle another pregnancy and we can welcome another baby (or two or three...) into our lives. But that's not what the Lord has for me. And I don't know why.
There are moments when I can forget this dream, and sometimes depending on the hour with the boys, it's quite easy (ha!). But whenever I see a little baby, whenever I look at my boys growing up so fast, whenever I congratulate another friend on their adorable Instagram announcement, it feels as though I'm underwater and cannot come up for a breath. I sit there and think - why God? Are you trying to rip everything from my hands? You've stripped me of my health, and my ability to play the piano, and my ability to grab my watercolors and just paint at will, and running with my boys, and being the wife I so badly want to be... and then this too? Why?
I don't know why. I may not ever know. Job never found out - his health was restored and he was blessed with more material possessions and other children, but he never found out the reason for his suffering. Never.
But... then tonight I read 2 Corinthians. Specifically 2 Corinthians 1:3-5 and I remembered sweet truth:
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For as we share abundantly in Christ's sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.
It's not as though I haven't read this verse before. Nor is it that I have forgotten that my God is a God of comfort. Honestly, I have just refused to fight against the lies that are pounding me and saying that the Lord is not for me, that He has spurned my heart's desires, that He loves others more than me.
I know that this is walking in sin. My questioning of God's goodness and plan for my life is akin to telling Him that I know better, that I know what is right and wrong and good and bad more perfectly than He does. It's insanity to think this, because I know the truth. I know that He is a good Father who loves me, who saved and redeemed me, who has my good in mind and who does not allow any suffering to come to me without first allowing to to pass through His hands.
I am mourning. And yet, I feel as though the Lord is opening my eyes to really see this passage of scripture in a new way.
No, I don't know the unfathomable pain of losing a child. No, I cannot relate to years and years of infertility. No, I haven't walked through an adoption process that was so close to closing and then dissolved in the very last moment. But I do know the pain of wanting something so badly it hurts, and having the Lord say "no". I do know what it is like to mourn dreams and hopes and ideas of what life "should" look like and to know that this "season" of suffering isn't likely to be short. I do know what it feels like to have one thing, after another, after another feel like it has been stripped away. I know what it's like to feel alone and helpless and bereaved even in the face of countless blessings. And maybe that's the point.
Maybe that's why the Lord has said "no" to more children. If I can sob alongside another mourning soul who is afflicted and bring them even the tiniest bit of comfort - that will be the Lord working in this. If I can finally admit that we will not be able to have more children, even though my heart literally feels like it is breaking while typing it out - that will be the Lord working in this. And if I can continue to press on to know the heart of my Father and live in His will even when the lies of Him being a "capricious, unloving God" are hurled at my soul - that will be the Lord working in this.
No, I'm not "at peace" about having to give this desire up. I'm not "at peace" with knowing that my Mama's heart that longs for one more child will not be given the opportunity to hold that baby in my womb. I'm not. But I am finally willing to admit that. I am willing to ask the Lord to start the slow and painful process of removing that desire from my heart and replacing it with His desires for my life and family. I am willing to stop praying that the Lord would change Andrew's mind and actually agree to try for "just one more". I'm willing to share this and be honest with my pain and my lack of trust and faith. And honestly, that right there is the Lord working in this.
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